Texas Right to Life Releases 2017 Disappointments List

On Wednesday, Texas Right to Life released the Pro-Life Scorecard for 2017, showing how each legislator performed during the regular and special sessions of the 85th Texas Legislature. Texas Right to Life sorted through hundreds of record votes on Pro-Life issues to calculate and determine scores and rankings.

However, the majority of the negotiations, debates, and work that determines if a bill passes or dies is done behind closed doors, safely out of the view of the grassroots and voters. Therefore, Texas Right to Life is also releasing a 2017 Pro-Life Heroes list and a 2017 Disappointments list in conjunction with our scorecards to tell the whole story of who helped and who hindered life-saving measures during the 85th Legislature.

The 2017 Disappointments list highlights the elected officials who actively worked against priority Pro-Life legislation. Many Pro-Life activists, grassroots observers, and voters are perplexed that life-saving priority legislation often fails to reach the floor of the Texas for debate and votes. When the Republican party, the only party that commits to protecting Life in the platform, holds the executive branch and near super-majorities in both chambers of the legislature, passage of meaningful Pro-Life bills should be clear and efficient.

However, our list of 2017 Disappointments further demonstrates that not all who campaign as Pro-Life actually want to pass Pro-Life laws. While some Disappointments actively worked to kill Pro-Life legislation or to stop other legislation that could have served as a vehicle for Pro-Life policies, others sullied their records by publicly speaking against Pro-Life amendments and legislation. And then a few filed outright anti-Life bills, knocking all the way to the lowest rankings.

2017 Disappointments

Byron Cook

Sarah Davis

J.D. Sheffield

John Zerwas

Ernest Bailes

Larry Gonzales

Cindy Burkett

Ken King

Lance Gooden

Jason Villalba

Stay tuned: On Monday, Texas Right to Life will post full detailed scorecards for each individual legislator to show how he or she did on each vote; commentary will be provided as to why legislators earned a place on the 2017 Pro-Life Heroes or 2017 Disappointments list.